


Wishing Can't Fix This

by FireSoul



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Genies, Heartbreak, Magic, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-16
Packaged: 2019-07-30 00:35:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,656
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16275572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FireSoul/pseuds/FireSoul
Summary: After Leonard Snart returns from The Oculus he and Sara are having some trouble settling back into their old ways. A lot has changed after all, and Sara might need to consider evaluating that.





	1. Make it Stop

**Author's Note:**

> *sighs* Why people like this series from my prompts so much I have no idea, but it's it's own thing now.

“No one is using the last wish!” Sara exclaims, understandably frustrated. Long story short they accidently released a genie whose bottle fell through their magical dimension portal, and they’ve just barely managed the clean up the 1950’s from the last two wishes.

“Fine,” the genie, who keeps insisting they simply call her Genie, disinterestedly agrees while picking at her nails. “I’ll just hang around here.”

Sara rolls her eyes, clearly not amused, but Genie doesn’t seem to care.

“Why don’t we wish we never found her?” Snart, newly returned to the team, suggests and now it’s him Sara is directing her, less than positive, attention towards.

“Have you not been paying attention?” She nearly snaps, “We are trying to _avoid_ paradoxes.”

“And not turning things back to normal is going to do that?” Snart demands, and so starts the bickering that has become commonplace on the ship ever since Snart returned.

“Man, I-” Ray starts to say, but he stops himself, Genie eyeing him not quite hopefully but, well, she knows he was about to say her magic words. “They used to be such good friends.” He decides on saying instead.

“Sara and Snart?” Zari asks, rightfully skeptical. “Are you kidding me? He’s been here a month and I don’t think I’ve ever seen them not trying to kill each other. I mean, he’s worse than I was at first, and that’s saying something.”

“I know,” Ray sighs, “During the first mission they were joined at the hip almost, especially after Mick betrayed us. We all had a pool going on when they would… you know… get together.” It seems so weird to say now, after everything that’s changed, and Sara’s with Ava but Ray could swear that the feelings she had for Snart are still there. They just need a push.

“I got an idea.” Genie pipes up from behind the two, though her gaze is settled more on Ray.

“You were the one talking about Aladdin earlier, using the last wish to set me free and all.” She reminds him, “Well, if you do free me, I’ll still have my powers. So how about a deal?” She suggests, and he knows he shouldn’t be listening, but his curiosity is peaked. “You set me free, and I’ll do you a favor; I’ll get those two to make up.”

“You could do that?” Ray asks, and Genie nods with a Cheshire Cat like grin.

“Ray…” Zari trails, voice suspicious, which he supposes is fair.

“What about Ava?” He asks, because she doesn’t deserve to be hurt, but Genie holds her hands up in a gesture of surrender.

“I can’t control that,” she admits, “I’m not going to force mom and dad over there to make out or anything extreme like that. All I’m gonna do is put them in a position to talk out their issues.”

“And when you say a position…” Ray trails off and at that Genie actually scrunches her nose.

“Not like that!” She swears, “No, nothing like that. Just a situation, and I’ve already told you I can’t kill people or anything. They won’t be in any danger. All I’m going to do is transport them somewhere, a completely safe somewhere where you’ll be able to find them, that there isn’t much else to do other than talk.”

That doesn’t sound so bad, and if she’s giving him her word that they can still get to them, maybe this will be nothing more than a thank you for her freedom. It would be nice to have Sara and Snart on the same side again.

“I don’t know about this Ray,” Zari says, distrusting, but the look in Genie’s eyes is so pleading, and the sounds of Sara and Snart fighting in the background is so loud and tiresome.

“Ok,” he agrees, “Genie, I wish you were free.”

Genie actually squeals in delight, “As you wish!”

Next there is a puff of pink smoke around her, small but enough grab the attention of the others. When the smoke dissipates Genie is still there, but now wearing regular skinny jeans, white t-shirt, and a motorcycle jacket instead of her traditional uniform.

“Yes!” She shrieks before lunging forward and actually hugging Ray. “Thank you Ray!” She squeals and he returns the hug happily.

Once she lets him go, still smiling from ear to ear, she steps back and grabs ahold of her lamp.

“Now…” she trails, taking the smallest step forward and toward the speechless group of time travelers watching her. “The lamp still needs a prisoner, unless you want another tear in reality on your hands.” She explains, her eyes narrowing in on Sara and Snart. “And you two look like you could stand to be locked in a room together for awhile.”

With no other warning she twists the top of the lamp and throws it at them, Sara tries to hit it away but there’s another puff of pink smoke and when it clears the lamp rattles to the floor.

No Sara or Snart in sight.


	2. It's Complicated

This is a new low.

Hunting magical fugitives Sara had expected it would come with a certain degree of, well, weirdness, but this is past the line of ridiculous. She and Leonard have managed to get themselves trapped inside of a genie’s bottle.

“No service,” Leonard grimaces, glaring at his phone, and Sara snorts.

“Shocker,” she scoffs, they’ve already established that the comms aren’t working so why he thought his cell phone would is beyond her.

He probably didn’t, if she’s being honest.

“Who are you even trying to call?” She decides to ask, most of the team doesn’t carry their phones off the ship, it’s too much of a risk if they’re spotted in most time periods.

“Charlie,” Leonard answers nonchalantly and Sara has to bite down on her tongue to keep from groaning, she should’ve known.

“She takes her phone out into the 50’s?” She asks, trying not to sound overly judgmental. She stands up to pace with the words, the lamp is roomier than she would’ve expected.

Len shrugs at her; still tapping at the screen in his hand like he expects it’s suddenly going to pick up a signal.

“She carries her phone everywhere, she likes to be prepared.”

Sara stops her pace for a fraction of a second, wondering he is actively trying to bother her. Ever since he came back they’ve been trying to get along, but so far they’ve managed to do nothing more than piss each other off at every turn and this is one of those times Sara thinks he might be doing it on purpose.

She knows she’s been guilty of that once or twice over the past few months.

“She’s putting the timeline at risk.”

She knows she shouldn’t have said it, that she should just keep her mouth shut and wait out however long they’re trapped here in the heavy silence that seems to have become her and Leonard’s new normal. But she can’t take the words back once they’re out, and Leonard gives her a curious glance before returning his attention to his phone.

“The timeline is always at risk,” he decides to say, rather diplomatically in Sara’s opinion. “Especially with this crew guarding it.”

“And what’s that supposed to mean?” Her retort is quick, and full of offence. Her hands settle firmly on her hips and she wonders for not the first time since Leonard came back what is wrong with her. She doesn’t want to keep picking fights with him, but she can’t stop herself, because the alternative is just so messy.

He looks at her as though she’s insane, which she’ll admit only to herself is fair.

“That I’ve missed two years and I can still name at least fifteen examples of the team putting the timeline in danger.” He answers, putting his phone away and talking half a step towards her. “More if I count the things I’ve seen since coming back.” Another step forward, “Example one; we’re trapped in a genie’s bottle.”

He keeps his eyes trained on her, expectantly, and she glances away uncomfortably. She has something to say, but she doesn’t want to say it, she doesn’t want to go there. Of all the things she could throw in his face she doesn’t want it to be that one.

But when he steps away she just can’t stop herself.

“Well if we weren’t such screw ups, you and Charlie would still be trapped in the other dimension.”

He turns back and eyes her skeptically, and she holds her gaze firm on his, hoping her false confidence is enough to fool him.

“First off,” he says, turning back to face her fully but not moving any closer. “I don’t remember being trapped anywhere, you know that.” Now he takes a step closer, “Second off, what do you have against Charlie?”

She furrows her brow; she hadn’t expected that question.

“I don’t,” she answers but it’s obvious he isn’t buying it.

“Really?” He asks, his voice knowing in a way that once would have made her smile but now has her blood boiling in her veins. “Because it was one thing when she first came on, that I get, Mick told me all about Amaya. But it’s been months now Assassin, and she has never, not even once, shown any sign of betraying the team. In fact she has gone out of her way to protect them when it comes down to it, and you’re still picking at her and judging her every chance you get. Why?”

He’s never yelled at her before, and this isn’t quite yelling right now, but it’s enough to make Sara take half a step back away from him, and the fire in his eyes, along with the old nickname, is plenty to make her clench her fists.

“In case you haven’t noticed Leonard, a lot has changed since you’ve been gone-”

“Believe me I’ve noticed,” he snorts but she continues like he hasn’t even spoken.

“I’m the one in charge now. Pointing out mistakes, _everybody’s_ mistakes, is a part of my job.”

“Well whose pointing out yours?!”

The argument stops there, both of them standing there with their chests heaving more than they had noticed, their eyes locked on each other.

It’s in that moment, with a deep pit settling into her stomach, that Sara realizes how long overdue this conversation is.

She doesn’t answer, she doesn’t have an answer he’ll accept, and when he speaks again his tone is much lower.

“That’s what I thought,” he says, glaring down at her in the way that he never used to.

“Thought what?” She bites back before he can turn away. “You think I don’t beat myself up over every bad call? That I haven’t learned from the mistakes I’ve made since becoming Captain?” She gives him a chance to answer, and that may very well be the exact reason he doesn’t. “Of course not,” she eventually huffs, “Because it’s easier for you to hate me if I don’t know what I’m doing.”

“I don’t hate you,” he all but growls.

“Really?” She asks, exasperated with disbelief. “Because you don’t talk to me, when you do you’re digging at me, and every time I turn around you’re all buddy-buddy with Charlie-”

“What do you have against Charlie?!” He suddenly snaps, voice louder and sharper than she has ever heard it before. “She’s new on the team, and I feel like a stranger, that’s why I get along with her! What do you care anyway? You’re dating that woman at the Time Bureau! You’re the one who wanted to just be friends when-”

“We are not just friends and you fucking know it!”

If their argument stopped before, all of time stops this time.

Well, technically, time was already stopped, it apparently doesn’t move in a genie bottle. But still, it feels even more like the atmosphere is frozen around them and all Sara can think to do is to sink back on the hard chair she’d been sitting on earlier and bury her head in her hands as she tries to form a coherent thought.

“When you came back,” she eventually says, looking up but not at him. “I just wanted to kiss you. Well, first I wanted to slap you for dying, and then I wanted to kiss you.” She hears him chuckle at that, but despite it she can’t bring herself to smile.

“But I was, I am, with Ava. And every day I think about…” She can’t bring herself to say it, she hates herself too much for even thinking it, but she doesn’t have to say anything because Leonard is already kneeling down in front of her.

“Does she make you happy?” He asks, and she can see in his face that it’s one of the more painful things he has ever had to ask.

It’s definitely one of the most painful things she’s ever had to answer.

“Yes.” She mumbles the word, so low and full of shame.

He doesn’t say anything at first, and she brings her eyes to focus on her lap, on her fists clenched one over the other, on anything but him.

“You know that’s all I want, right?” He asks, and she nods mutely. “I was gone for two years Assassin, things changed.”

She scoffs, she doesn’t need him to tell her that.

“Look,” he starts again, “For what it’s worth I don’t have any interest in Charlie, she reminds me too much of Lisa to ever think of her as anything other than a friend or a little sister.” She looks at him then, and he’s smiling at her, so she can’t help but to smile a little bit as well.

“I just have one question,” he continues and she nods for him to continue. “Does Ava know… about us?”

She almost wants to snort, to say there never was any “us” for Ava to know about, but she knows what he means.

“I haven’t told her,” she admits, “But I think she suspects something’s up, or something was up, she gets a little weird whenever I talk about you.”

“You talk about me?” He drawls in a way that makes her finally lose control of her laughter.

“Nothing good,” she half teases, though it is true. With the way things have been lately any time she’s been talking about Leonard she’s been complaining.

“Well,” he says, apparently willing to forgive her for now. “That being said, I think you need to talk to her.” She raises an eyebrow at him and he laughs. “You’re not going to solve anything by just having the conversation in your head. Talk to Ava, at the very least she deserves to know what’s going on. And then, if you need me, you know where to find me.”

She smiles at his words, and she’s about to thank him, when the entire room starts shaking.

“Looks like the team found us.” Len says, turning to her as she stands. “You ready?”

“No,” she answers with a smirk, but it doesn’t matter if she’s ready our not, because her world starts to blur and her feet fly off the ground.


	3. Cards on the Table

After getting out of the lamp, and handling everything with Genie, Sara knows she needs to take Leonard’s advice and talk to Ava. She also knows that she doesn’t want to head into that conversation without any sort of plan for what she’s going to say. So she makes, what she believes, is a reasonable next move; she locks herself in her room.

Well, she doesn’t actually lock the door, but she does shut herself in and go straight to bed. She just needs to sleep on it, or more accurately, she needs to lie awake in silence and stress over it for a few hours.

The ship’s morning cycle comes too quickly, and when it does Sara knows she isn’t going to have much more time to sort this out. She moves about her morning routine slower than usual, a dark cloud of dread hovering over her entire being. Even after being awake for most of the night she still doesn’t have a fully formulated plan for this, nor can she say she is completely sure she knows what she wants the end results to be. She doesn’t want Ava or Leonard to hate her, she knows that much.

“Captain Lance,” Gideon’s voice suddenly echoes throughout her room. “Director Sharp is on the bridge and currently on her way here.”

Of course she is, because this couldn’t just happen on her terms.

“Thanks Gideon,” Sara says, tone almost resigned.

She decides to wait in her room, to let Ava guide this for as long as possible before she will inevitably have to take over. It isn’t long before there’s a knock on her door and she’s ushering her girlfriend inside.

“Are you ok?” It’s the first thing out of Ava’s mouth when she enters, her eyes wide and frantic as she marches into the room. “Ray says you were trapped in a Genie lamp yesterday?”

Yup, they’re getting right into it.

 “Yeah,” she says, arms crossing anxiously over her chest. “Me and Leonard.”

“You were stuck there with Snart?” Ava questions, and Sara can’t help but to wince uncomfortably.

“Yeah um… I sort of wanted to talk to you about that.”

Now Ava looks worried, which Sara supposes is fair.  
“What happened?”  
“Nothing,” Sara quickly assures her, taking a step closer to her. “Nothing, nobody got hurt or anything. We just… we talked, and I think there are some things that I should tell you.”

Ava doesn’t look like she knows what to do with that, so Sara leads her over to sit on her bed. Once there she should start talking, but instead she’s silent, taking a few seconds to breathe before she starts saying things she can never take back.

“Sara?”

“When Rip first recruited us,” she immediately starts once Ava’s said her name, “Things were… different. I wasn’t much more than, as Ray put it, a lost assassin-”

“Don’t say that,” Ava pleads with her, taking her hands. “You are not a lost assassin.”

“Not anymore,” Sara agrees, giving her girlfriend’s fingers a gentle squeeze before reclaiming her hands. “But back then I was. And Leonard was a crook. We were enough alike that we became friends and then… a few hours before The Oculus blew he asked me about being something more.”

She stops there, let’s Ava sit with the information for as long as she needs. Surprisingly it isn’t more than a few seconds, though she doesn’t give much in the way of a reaction.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

She waits again, trying to be patient while Ava processes this.  
“Did…” She eventually stutters, “Did you say yes?”

Sara gives a sigh; this is going to be the hard part.

“I was mad at him,” she admits, “He had pulled his gun on me-”

“He _what_?” Ava suddenly demands, her eyes narrowing and burning with a protective fury.

“He was _bluffing._ ” Sara promises, and she doesn’t think Ava believes her, yet she also finds that she doesn’t care. “Anyway, he came to my room later to apologize and asked me, since back then we still thought we were going home after taking down Savage, about what the future might hold for us, and since I wasn’t ready to let him off the hook yet I challenged him to steal a kiss from me.”

It’s another few seconds before Ava answers, a mix of fear, anger, and heartbreak on her face that makes Sara want nothing more than two lean forward and wrap her arms around her and promise that this is all going to be ok.

But she can’t.

“Did he?” Ava eventually asks, and she isn’t asking about The Oculus.

“No,” Sara answers, and she can’t tell if that puts Ava at ease or not. “He wanted us to talk.”

Ava looks surprised at that, and Sara feels her heart stinging with just a hint of anger.

“Ok,” Ava eventually says, clearly trying her damnedest to keep her voice even. “Do you… would you have said yes?”

Sara lets her eyes flit down to her lap, and she hears Ava sigh, her shoulders deflating.

She would’ve said yes. If it weren’t for Ava she would still say yes if he asked her. There’s no point in denying that.

“Well,” Ava finally says, looking like she’s torn between the need to cry or just stomp away in a fit of rage, something Sara wouldn’t blame her for. “I hope he makes you happy.”

She rises then, moves for the door and Sara wants so badly to reach out and stop her.

But she doesn’t.

She listens as the door opens and swishes shut, the soft _tick, tack_ sound of Ava’s flats on the metal floor fading away as the tears well up in her eyes. She hates that it has to be this way, that not only does she have to hurt Ava but also herself if she truly wants to be happy. Yes, Ava makes her happy, but even in the best moments of their relationship something always felt… off.

So, she isn’t entirely surprised that amongst all the guilt and heartache she feels, regret isn’t there. This is right. For the first time in three years, Sara can feel in her bones that what she’s doing, no matter how messy, is right.


	4. In the End

She doesn’t go right to Leonard. If that’s because she has her own heartbreak to sort out, or simply because she hates the idea of being that girl who breaks up with someone just so she can be with someone else, Sara is pretty sure she’ll never know. It’s probably a mix of the two, if she’s being honest. Regardless she stays in her room for a few hours until she can’t take staring at the same four walls anymore, and only after getting Gideon to tell her the whereabouts of everyone else so she can avoid them does she finally leave.

She avoids the library and the galley, two places where the majority of the team is gathered according to Gideon. The rest are in their own rooms, including Leonard, and Sara doesn’t feel ready to face that yet. Instead she heads to the jump ship, and upon closing the hatch behind her she lets out an exhausted sigh. She sinks down into the driver’s seat and, propping her feet on the edge of the dash, she leans her head against her knees. The tears have stopped by now, though she’s sure later she’ll have more. In fact, she knows it. Later isn’t going to be a fun time. Not only will she have to face Ava again, eventually, but she’ll also have to face Gary and his puppy-dog “my ship is dead” face. Then there’s her own team, who she honestly couldn’t predict the reactions of even if she wanted to.

Mick will be happy, she thinks; though he likely won’t show it with more than a rising of his beer. Ray will likely have mixed feelings about the whole thing, but he’ll come around soon. As for the others, well, they never knew her and Leonard.

She loses track of how long she stays in the jump ship, only aware that it’s long enough that she’s surprised no alarms have gone off yet. It doesn’t surprise her when a knock finally comes from the door, and so she uncurls herself and heaves a sigh.

“Come in.”

It’s Leonard who walks in, predictably. He’s watching her carefully the moment that he lays eyes on her; looking for any sort of indication that she’s semi-ready to have this conversation.

A tired smile is the best she can manage to give him.

He doesn’t say a word until he is fully in the escape vessel, which right now feels more like that prison of a lamp than an escape, and the hatch is closed behind him. Even then, they remain silent for a long moment. Him standing, her sitting; the two of them just staring at each other.

Eventually he takes a seat, she swivels her chair to keep facing him, and he sighs.

“Did you talk to Ava?”

She looks down at her lap, fiddling with some fuzz on her jeans.

“Yeah,” she mumbles with a tiny nod.

He waits a minute, maybe for her to say something else, but she doesn’t.

“How’d it go?”

“We broke up.”

More silence, deafening now. She just wants him to say something, anything.

“I’m sorry.”

Anything but that.

“Don’t be,” she shrugs, and now she finally brings her head up to look him in the eyes, her expression a thoughtful frown. “We almost didn’t.”

Now she’s ok with the silence, in fact she almost smiles at the surprised look on Leonard’s face.

“What happened?” He finally asks, and she shrugs.

“I just wanted to talk.” She begins, “You were right in that Ava deserves to know about us, our history, and that I do still have feelings for you.” She leans over and takes his hand then, her eyes remaining firmly locked onto his. “But Ava and I have been together for six months. I drove myself nuts thinking about it, trying to make up my mind, but honestly Snart? When she walked through that door… I really hoped she wouldn’t be walking out.”

She gives him some time to process that, and while he looks unsettled his grip strengthening on her fingers only cements that she made the right choice.

“What happened?”

She smiles a little, a sad smile.

“I told her about the start of the mission, about who I was… she was pretty quick to argue it.”

He knits his brow together at that, “I don’t understand.” He says, a strange sentence to come from Leonard Snart of all people. “What do you mean she argued who you were?”

She sighs, thinking about what she’s about to say, and frankly, how stupid she feels for not realizing it sooner.

“She told me I’m not a lost assassin, and I’m not; not anymore.” She let’s go of Leonard’s hand with that, needing to get up and pace, even if their in an area as confined as the jump ship.

“After I was possessed by the death totem she told me we could fight my past together. But the things I’ve been through… they aren’t the kind of things you can fight! And even if they were I wouldn’t want to! If I never got on that boat, if I never became an assassin, if I never died!... I wouldn’t be here. And I love being here. I love who I’ve become and I’m proud of what I’ve accomplished.”

She takes a minute to breath then, and to notice the wry grin Leonard is giving her. Not because he’s happy she had to break up with Ava, but because he understands. Because he’s proud of everything she’s accomplished as well.

“My past isn’t something that I want to deny.” She shakes her head, plain and simple.

He gets that, she knows he does. He has his own demons, his own checkered past that he would rather remember than forget. If he hadn’t been who he was he never would’ve found himself here, he never would’ve become a hero.

She takes the seat next to him, her hands finding his once again. His eyes meet hers with a silent question, and she smirks. She rubs her thumb across his knuckles, lifting his hand to her mouth so she can place a light kiss where her thumb has been. That’s when he leans forward, capturing her mouth in a sweet, loving kiss that she’s been waiting three years for. The kiss only confirms what she believes; that he understands.

He gets her.


End file.
